Change is sometimes a good thing, sometimes not. Many of these changes with gold rush are not good. Many loyal players objected and still do. Players give you input, but what happens? CPW is basically silent. It is a very sad state of things, when you/development team @KellyGray have taken a game people love to play, and make changesIf changes are good and players like them, great, if changes are stupid (bigfoot) and not well recieved (doc devalue, steel limitations, etc. ) why do you keep them? Are the developers so aloof that they cant admit they screwed this up and fix things?. People do make errors, but some can admit they made a mistake, CPW obviously cannot.

One more thing, which reinforces my earlier point. You announce we will play a cattle battle, so players prepare by saving cards for that event. Then after the fiasco of gold rush last week is over,, you change course after everyone has prepared by saving cards for a cattle battle and announce another of these stupid gold rush events. People once again object. but nothing is said, nothing is done. not even an "Oops, we forgot we said that." The piousness of this attitude is what makes people mad and upset. It shows how little you care @KellyGray for what your loyal players thing, say and do.

Everyone, I think we can save our breath, nary a word from CPW about all of our complaints. And what do they do about trying to fix things, simply say to heck with you, you don't like it, we will,domit again and show you who is boss. the bottom line is they just don't care!

-When I noticed the modifications, I just couldn't understand the huge difference to the healing card. Nerfing is ok but that sure is a lil too much lol. So Dr Waltz card time will be improved, and can merge at 3. Not complaining anymore here.-If you feel it unfair to have to use diamonds to heal because you think that it forces you to purchase diamonds... well, there are many diff ways of earning diamonds for free, as you know, that were added since the start of this game. Lately I noticed that I earn diamonds when successfully defending my town. Watching videos gives diamonds cards once in a while, achievements etc. I bought a pack when I first started playing and didn't feel the need to buy diamonds since then. No complain here. -You don't like snow, well Bigfoot does. There is snow in many other games too... Lol.-The strategy is different than with the other event, and it doesn't take as long to finish each fight. But I'm still having hard time to figure out a better strategy to destroy the 2's. I'm enjoying the challenge though.-I'm not using Bigfoot in this event because other troopers reach and destroy the main target before Bigfoot can do any damage at all. But I use it when attacking players by dropping him near the main target, when possible, close to the end, once I have enough extra points.-I do think that merging cattle and gold rush time cards would be great since we need more room for the Bigfoot cards.-Me and my boyfriend are both enjoying this event and are doing great at it too. I'm level 34, he is 31. I make the maximum pts almost each time. He has less notorious cards than I do and he still does good, with a different strategy than mine.I realize that most of the players here aren't enjoying this new event, but we do. Maybe just keep trying something different than usual, get out of your comfort zone. Also, try to focus on the main target instead of trying to kill everyone, and use flags wisely... Most of the time, it is possible not to touch any mine. I use between 2-4 flags max., and very often no death. And if nothing works for you, then skip the event, most posses won't kick you for missing an event (call sick lol) and many won't kick if you make pts only once in the event.

@Kay: I do not play this event because it is boring. I did almost 200k last weekend in gold rush with playing two days almost nothing. I sent 5 trains again and again resulting in about 5 min healing time. There is no challenge for players at higher levels. Just run in with 5 mercenaries and 11 wranglers, destroy the mines and out. There is no need for strategy, changing troops based on different layouts. The biggest challenge is to choose the left or the right mine to attack first.

So why should I bore myself every two weeks by that? With no challenge there is no fun. It's as simply as that.

And I totally agree that they need to remove cowbell and miner cards and replace them with one card for both events.

We can speculate till we are blue in the face as to why CPW made the choices they did planning the latest update. clearly we aren't going to get a satisfactory explaination from them. But we can give constructive criticism just in case it was an honest mistake, temporary brain burp, a bad trip, or the guidance of a delusional guru. (The only reasons I can imagine to explain how Bigfoot arrived in the picture)

Whatever the case, I suspect that by now they have picked up on the strong negative reaction, acknowledgement or not.

1) Dr. Waltz 'balancing': We won't be getting Dr. Waltz Sr. back, here's why...The previous regular Dr. Waltz was very useful, but comparatively over valued.The regular card was based on the ludacrous 8+ hour heal time of the Notorious Dr. Waltz. 5 min = 1/100th of 500 minutes. The new 1 minute Dr. Waltz is based on working backward from the 90 minute Notorious Dr. Waltz card. 1 min = 1/90th of 90 minutes.

I have experimented using all of my 150 sidekicks in several consecutive raids, the longest heal time needed with a level 10 medical wagon was 104 minutes. The 90 minute heal time of the new Notorious Dr. Waltz seems spot on! The 1 minute card, as useless as it is, is both a logical increment of the Notorious card and in line with the uselessness of all the other 'regular' cards.

Though I understand the 'rebalancing', I was angry at the severe devaluation of the cards I had in my hand, without any attempt to offer a more equitable trade in.My investment split 5:1 ....and I was given a 1:1 trade in! That did feel like theft.

The average # of posse points was 75% of usual, the 'median' player scored 64% of normal.Almost none of our 20's & 30's level members were able to send in any trains once they reached 2 mine GR battles.

When the next event turned out to be another Gold Rush event, contrary to original announcement. At least 2 members have quit the game. 4 others have yet to send in a train, and may have quit.

Those of us with large numbers of legendary Wranglers & Mercenaries are not being challenged at all! But our members without are struggling to fill a train before the time runs out, and are NOT finding the game entertaining, rewarding, or satisfying in any way.

3) Bigfoot: The animations of Bigfoot destroying building is amusing. But the animations in town, standing halfway in buildings, or the top of his head poking through a tower needs some work. Otherwise... my Bigfoot comments aren't particularly constructive.Just know that many members of my posse have started discarding their Bigfoot cards.

4) Mitch Miner: Having a second type of cool down card is a real strain on 'camp crowding'.When I started playing CPW 6 months ago there were 20 different 'town' cards & 32 different 'sidekick' cards, with the recent update we now have 32 'town' cards and 43 'sidekick' cards. An overall increase of 70% in the number of different cards! making a merge much more difficult. I find I'm discarding valuable cards to make room to open a pack of mostly useless cards.Yes, more of the 'town' cards merge using 3, but that doesn't help as much as you'd think. If your camps are full you need two 3 card merges to make the space to open a new 'pack'.

5) Platinum Packs: from the new icons on the Packs I see that there is no chance at all of getting level IV, or V cards in a Silver Pack, and no chance of level V cards in a Gold Pack. With the introduction of the Weekly Specials and Platinum Pack, the game appears to be drifting more and more away from 'the luck of the draw' and more towards deep pocketed players. This is unfortunate and distressing.

That's it for now in the 'constructive criticism' department.

CPW, what you do with all the feedback you have received is up to you, but please, PLEASE, do something with it!

Howdy folks! It has been super helpful to read all your feedback! Thanks @Oblio for all the stats! I am passing your suggestions back to our developers - it is really great to hear your tips, especially with Dr Waltz and other cards. I'm sorry to hear of your disappointment with some of our changes but I know it means that you're passionate and it is awesome and important that you write to let us know how things are going for y'all out West!

Otherwise... my Bigfoot comments aren't particularly constructive.Just know that many members of my posse have started discarding their Bigfoot cards.

Great post. Here is an attempt at a constructive critique of Bigfoot. Your mileage may vary.

From a player's point of view, when considering whether and how to use a new card, the question is not whether it is useful in and of itself. The question is whether it is more useful for a particular role than all of the available alternatives. This is the problem with Bigfoot. Its intended niche is fairly clear: a high hit-point, front-line, siege unit. However, in all but a very few specific situations, other units we already have fill this niche better, and this is a problem when all our units are competing with each other for camp space and steel for merges.

When approaching buildings with other troops, it walks too slowly to get to them and start doing damage before ranged troops have already done much of the destructive work. When grouped with those troops and all of them are actively attacking buildings, it swings too slowly and will often end up doing zero damage to medium and small buildings because they collapse from, for example, 49er bombs before Bigfoot has finished one swing.

As a general tank to soak up damage and distract enemy troops, Bigfoot fails because, as far as I can see, he doesn't even attack them. He walks on through toward the nearest building. Because much of the unit "aggro" code is based on being shot by another unit first ("hey, he's attacking me. I'll fight back."), Bigfoot often gets ignored and thus fails to divert enemy attention away from our more fragile units.

The only situation where I now drop Bigfoot, ever, is when I clear a camp immediately adjacent to an enemy player's courthouse/refinery. From there, Bigfoot doesn't have to walk anywhere and has a high hit-point target he can swing at several times, thus justifying his existence on the battlefield. Everywhere else, some other unit selection, like six 49ers (for the same 12 point deployment cost as one Bigfoot), are faster, more effective, and more versatile. (Needless to say, Gold Rushes and npc map sites don't have enough buildings to even consider using Bigfoot in those types of events.)

Combine these drawbacks with limited camp space and what sounds like an exorbitant merge cost (in steel) and it shouldn't surprise anyone that people are deleting these cards.

Suggestions for improvement:- bring Bigfoot's deployment cost down to 8 or 10 battle points.- decrease the steel cost for merging.- increase his swing speed, even if at the cost of reducing damage per swing. Then he will at least get one or two hits in on buildings that other units are also targeting.- make sure he actually tries to attack enemy troops running around at his feet, so that he can distract them and be an effective meat shield for an army on the approach.

@Gazza The dev.team has to stay in a very secure place were only the staff is allowed to talk to them ... normally you would say that they are in their mothers basement doing the things they do (best) ;-)

And now we come to the real sh*tstorm. Y'all gonna play this upcoming cattle battle event and realize the cost of the change to the dr cards. Just how many diamonds is it gonna take to replace all those lost minutes of healing? Some of you will be stupid enough to spend a lot to try and compete at the level you're used to. You should have joined the boycott. Trust me, goldrush is just a smokescreen for the real issue. They will give you something back for goldrush. Maybe even announce that the whole event is being scrapped because they are so in tune to, and concerned with the will of the players and, great guys that they are, they want to make you happy. But the dr cards.....yeah you ain't never getting that change fixed. They've been salivating for weeks over just how high profits are going to go when players are forced to spend to compete. And spend you will! Bunch of sheep. You deserve what you get. You should have joined the boycott.

Oblio, some solid observations. I will pass them on to the development team - yeahaw!

Seriously, one point your brought up about the cards hadn't been mentioned - a Sliver Pack is now devalued because it no longer offers a chance at IV or V level cards... This is indeed distressing, since many of us paid real money to purchase "permanent silver packs"... Sure pack is "Silver" - but not what you paid for. A classic "bait and switch" in terms of business practices, and not cool.

Tex, Snow, Fatman ... you all may be right! I also observe in our posses that after achieving new personal bests many players are all psyched up for the next cattle battle, and are expecting to achieve similar scores. If this extra zeal results in more open wallets and purses ... CPW's ploy will have worked. We wait and see! Personally, I have put my Credit Card in the freezer!

I havent spent a cent on this game, although i was gettin ready to before this fiasco. Glad i hung onto my cash, & didn't get taken for the ride so many others have. This used to be great game before the developers got greedy.

@Gazza, I haven't put my card in the freezer but I am using it at another game. I have sent that game developer 3 tickets, one with every purchase letting them know that the money I just spent used to be NextGames for the CPW game but not any longer.

It will be unfortunate if the ploy does work. I have thought from the start that they were trying to weed out the higher lvl players/posse's that don't spend.

Also troops, stop watching the ads in the ad wagon, cpw gets paid for those ads, I haven't watched any since they screwed us with the dr cards.

ALSO...........................

Kinda lame but maybe a class action for de valuing our cards? We all bought silver packs, they stole 80% of the value of the dr cards. Might get a couple penny's back, but what would it cost cpw to defend?.. Just a thought

@KellyGrey@Nekobasu Is there ever gonna be an other update? 3.0 or so. We all have been posting about nags and bugs, and nothing happens. And all higher level players are quiting because there is no way to grow. Give us an update ... a great one!